We were in the car happily singing and chatting, my oldest daughter asked me "do you believe in god?"
And just like that my world collapsed for a minute.
I want to believe in god, i want to think that i will get to spend the rest of time knowing what will happen. Watch my children from some heavenly place. See them grow old and succeed and fail. Fuck it all up and figure it out again. Fall in and out of love. And love until they bleed.
But i won't. And that hurts more than any words could do justice to.
I saw death. Perhaps one could argue that i didn't see death, i just saw complete unconsciousness. But, that's not true. I saw the end and it was nothing. There was no regret or longing. No rush of memories or flood of guilt. It was nothing. It was gone. For a split second my world was black and there wasn't a single thought, a single feeling in my body.
And that is the closest i will ever come to a religious experience – the complete absence of anything.
And i tell my daughter "no, i don't."
{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
I want to believe sometimes too… but I am more interested in like super natural things and the chupacabra!
The clusterfuck in all of this is that heaven and spiritual aren’t really the same thing. You obviously try to be a good person – loving, kind, compassionate, sensitive – and those are all spiritual (godly?) ideals. Otherwise, why bother? If it’s all nothingness, then you could easily say fuck it, and live with no regard for anyone.
But you don’t, so that’s a version of faith, or whatever. Just because you don’t believe in an eternal heaven doesn’t preclude spiritual influence in life. (My 2cents).
In otherwords, it doesn’t have to be so damn depressing!
You know, believing in GOD (whatever your understanding of what GOD is) does not make you a weak person. It just means that you relinquish control to a higher power. And… that actually gives you freedom… check it out.
and…sorry for the and. What is the worst thing that can happen about believing in God… that it’s not true and you have to go to Hell? I’d rather hitch my wagon to the chance that it is true and I get to go to a super awesome place called Heaven…. just sayin…. btw if you want to chit chat more about this I’m open. I’m not a hyped up over the top Christian born again. Just someone who believes, that’s all. Because, surely, it’s not me who is running this universe.
me, too.
It takes a brave person to admit a lack of “faith”. I’m with you. I’d love to believe but I just can’t jump off the edge into spiritual enlightenment.